Aformer Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice in Osun State, Mr. Niyi Owolade, and a lawyer, Mr. Musbau Lateef, have alleged that prosecutors handling corruption cases collude with defendants to frustrate the Federal Government’s anti-graft war.
According to the two lawyers, the alleged collaboration by prosecutors from the Ministry of Justice, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, Department of State Services and the Nigeria Police Force has been responsible for the failure of the Federal Government’s war against corruption to yield the expected results in terms of prosecution of culprits.
Lateef, who is also a lecturer in the Jurisprudence and Private Law Department of the Faculty of Law, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Osun State, argued that the Federal Government had been unsuccessful in its war against corruption because of the existence of some “bad eggs” in the nation’s judiciary and lack of diligent prosecution by prosecutors.
Attorney General should be independent. There should not be any politician in that office
He said, “There are so many factors affecting the anti-corruption fight negatively and I would not want to disagree that the bad eggs in the judiciary have contributed to the challenges of this war.
Although there are good ones in the judiciary, the bad eggs appear to be more powerful and they do not want the success of the anticorruption war.
“Other factors affecting the anti-graft war are lack of diligent prosecution and the fact that prosecutors collude with defendants to frustrate anti-graft prosecution. This has been affecting the state negatively. We need to develop our institutions and the personnel if there will be success in this war.
There is also the issue of corruption fighting back and the weaknesses in our laws are also affecting the prosecution of these corruption cases. I want to strongly advise that the judiciary should be more strengthened by making it independent.”
Owolade, who accused the DSS of “destroying” cases bearing on corruption before passing them to the EFCC, added that the politicisation of the office of the Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice had become a stumbling block to the success of the anti-graft war.
The former attorney general and lecturer, who spoke in Ososgbo, urged the National Assembly to reconsider the separation of the office of the AGF from that of the minister of justice to make them independent of each other and protect the chief law officer of the country against any political influence or manipulation.
On the need for the separation of the office of the AGF from that of the justice minister, Owolade said, “The National Assembly should reconsider separating this office because it has been politicised a lot. The political influence on this office is powerful and that is why there may not be any significant success in the fight against corruption.
“Attorney General should be independent. There should not be any politician in that office. This institution must be built and strengthened.Investigators and prosecutors should be trained and retrained because we now see the unfortunate instances where the DSS would have destroyed cases before passing them to the EFCC. One of these instances is the case of Justice Ademola and others.
“We have to train and retrain a sector of the police, especially. The police should stop parading suspects. It’s traumatic and unfortunate that the police parade suspects, when they are still carrying out investigation on them. The police need to stop this. They should upgrade their status. I also want to ask the Federal Government to take good care of the police and pay them well in order for them to discharge their duties as expected. “
